


Run On Gasoline

by InFamousHero



Series: Fragments of The Knight [1]
Category: Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic (Video Game)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Canonical Character Death, Flash Fiction, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Tragedy, Vignette, grey force
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-28
Updated: 2020-08-09
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:47:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 11,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25539004
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InFamousHero/pseuds/InFamousHero
Summary: A collection of shorts and vignettes covering the rise and fall of K'Surda Dorne through my interpretation of the Jedi Knight storyline, as I have lost all control of my life and 2020 just blows real hard, my dudes.Part 1 of a multi-part series, this is just placed at the start for chronological reasons.
Series: Fragments of The Knight [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/429265
Comments: 11
Kudos: 22





	1. Jedi Rising

**Author's Note:**

> The title is a reference to my favourite song in K'Surda's playlist, Gasoline by Halsey.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter covers events on Tython.

“We’ll be touching down in five minutes.”

K’Surda’s stomach flutters at the announcement. She takes a deep breath, trying not to let her nerves get to her even as her leg starts bouncing. The shuttle shakes as it hits Tython’s atmosphere and she clutches her necklace. Maybe it wasn’t orthodox to keep it, she wasn’t _supposed_ to maintain any ties to her family as a Jedi, but it helped her remember where she came from and calm down. If she can survive growing up in the harsh desert canyons of Tatooine, she can survive anything.

She wonders what she’ll be doing on Tython, what kind of people she’ll meet, what her master will be like, if she’ll meet the _Grand Master_ herself. That thought only makes K’Surda’s nerves worse but its excitement more than anything. The idea of meeting such a legendary figure makes her practically giddy. All these amazing, courageous people and she was finally going to join them in making the galaxy a better place.

K’Surda clenches her hand on the necklace. Even if she can’t go home, if she has to let her family go, it’s worth it if it means she can help people. The Order helped _her_ after all. It’s only fair.

The pilot speaks again. “We’re coming up on the temple grounds now. Good luck, Padawan.”

An involuntary grin overtakes her face. The shuttle lands gently and K’Surda stands, letting go of the necklace. The ramp opens onto a circular landing pad, and the sound of crashing waterfalls spills in. She breathes slowly for a moment, holds her head high, shoulders back, and strides into the bright sunlight of Tython.

Into her new life.

* * *

K’Surda didn’t expect to prove herself quite so soon, but she leapt into action regardless, cutting a path into the Gnarls. The Flesh Raiders are imposing and brutish, but they bleed, and her training sabres stand up to the challenge of properly armed opponents.

It’s her first time killing a sentient. Hunting is one thing, its own complex tangle of emotions the first time you kill a living creature for food and leather, but feeling the life go out of another thinking being nearly gets her killed in turn. She wasn’t prepared for the sensation of it, the visual, or the sound. But others need her, Padawans who can’t defend themselves, so she steels herself and presses onward, learns in a trial by fire to tune out the death if she wants to do her duty.

For as many aggressors as she cuts down, there always seem to be more, and she does what she can to get the less combat-ready Padawans out of harm’s way. Some are easier to convince, sitting in a cage surrounded by violent captors knocked the fight out of them, others are stubborn and she has to talk them around to getting out of danger instead of pursuing revenge.

It’s only when she’s soaked with sweat and spotted with Flesh Raider blood that Master Relnex finally points her to the source of the problem, and she charges headlong into a cavern on the far side of the Gnarls.

She expects to find more Flesh Raiders, and she does, but what she doesn’t expect to find is another Jedi. A troubled Jedi—a _dark_ Jedi—and she finds him tormenting another helpless Padawan, a young Bith.

He talks of cleansing, purifying, but the blood and terror in the training grounds is enough to make her cut him off before he can finish justify it. The flash of a lightsaber isn’t enough to break her focus, and she strikes him _and_ his guards down in a matter of moments, breathing hard.

The fact he was a Jedi hits her like a drunk Gamorrean, and she stares at his body and the blood pooling under his head. She barely even notices the Bith, or the arriving Jedi Master until he touches her shoulder and she jumps.

He introduces himself as Orgus Din and praises her for handling the situation on her own despite her lack of a lightsaber. It’s a salve on the shock of it all. Many Padawans have their lives because of her, so perhaps the weight of killing isn’t so terrible to bear.

* * *

_“Taking a life affects the living Force and the one who does the killing.”_

Satele Shan’s words rattle around her head as she lays awake, staring at the ceiling and surrounded by sleeping Padawans. She knows it won’t be the last time she remembers those words and she holds her necklace tight.

“K’Surda, are you still awake?” The Bith Padawan from earlier, Unaw, whispers from the bunk beside her.

“Yeah,” she murmurs without looking.

He shifts to the edge of his bed, sitting up. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Are you?”

“I think so. I didn’t expect the day to be so frightening.”

Neither did she, K’Surda _expected_ her first day to be a lot of introductions and orientation. She certainly got that, but everything else was hard to parse once the adrenaline wore off.

He speaks again, asking, “is it true Master Orgus took you under his wing?”

She nods, “we’re heading out at dawn to see what we can do about the Flesh Raiders. I don’t know what to expect, but we’ll do our best.”

Unaw settles back down, pulling the sheets around his small body. “If anyone can solve it, it’ll be you and Master Orgus. You were braver than any of us.”

She looks at him, brows drawn together. “Hey, there’s bravery in surviving.”

He isn’t looking at her now, his big, dark eyes lidded and downcast. “That’s kind of you to say, but I have a long way to go.”

“And you’ll get there.”

“You think so?”

“This won’t keep you down. I believe in you.”

Unaw’s eyes squint happily in the darkness. “Thank you.”

* * *

A burning shame is all she can feel walking out of the Matriarch’s house. Shame _and_ frustration, Jedi were meant to help people, but Kalikori village stood alone against the Flesh Raiders all because the Republic deemed them illegal. It mixes in her mind with the way the council talked about the Flesh Raiders, primitive natives, and it sits uneasily on her tongue. There were so many people who saw the less technologically-advanced as inherently inferior. She hoped she wouldn’t find that in the Jedi, and yet.

K’Surda huffs out a deep, irritated breath, trying to reign in her anger at the situation. The suffering was so unnecessary. The Jedi could have—no, _should_ have—done something before it came to this. She wrings her hands and surveys the village, the tension in the air, and the tired, despondent faces of its defenders. Many bear scars yet to fade with time.

Whoever made that call in the Senate needed their heart checked, but it was the Jedi who stood and ignored pleas for help.

Enough was enough.

* * *

She tries to avoid fighting if she can, but she realises by sunset that she’s lost track of how many Flesh Raiders she’s had to cut down. She reassures herself that there are more important things to think about. It’s in service of protecting the innocents of Kalikori, and their pain was far greater than anything she had ever experienced.

K’Surda winces at the thought—there _was_ a brief point in her life where all she knew was pain and terror. It was why the Jedi Order took her in when nightmares of Coruscant left her catatonic as a child, one of many early signs that she was strong in the Force.

She shakes the thought away. The nightmares were temporary, empathic ripples through the Force, just an echo of someone else’s very real and present trauma, magnified by the thousands killed when the Empire attacked.

No, she has never felt as the Kalikori do, not personally.

She hopes she never does, but Orgus’s remark about Jedi destroyed by passion lingers at the back of her mind. She makes a point of hiding her necklace.

* * *

Quite a few heads turn when she walks into the temple with a Flesh Raider infant in her arms, still happily gnawing on a grisly piece of guid meat.

“Master Quilb?” she says, interrupting a conversation between the Cathar and a human Padawan, but he is quick to understand her urgency when he sees what she’s carrying.

“A Flesh Raider baby,” he murmurs, intrigued and astonished, “I assume it’s caretakers are dead?” He holds his arms out, and she carefully hands the little one over. It wriggles when she lets go, twisting around to stare at her with a look of confusion, and stops gnawing on the morsel.

K’Surda rubs her arm. “Yes, I found him next to a dead adult. I thought we could return him, but I didn’t want to risk doing it alone.”

Master Quilb hums in agreement, eyeing the infant. “You did the right thing in bringing it to me. I will convene with the council so we may decide how to handle this.”

“He should be returned. We’re not his people.”

“That will be for the council to decide. You have done your part, Padawan, run along.”

The dismissal makes her uneasy, but she doesn’t have the time to stand and argue. Orgus needs her back at Kalikori, so she lets it go.

She hopes she hasn’t made a mistake.

* * *

The toxins burn her throat and make her eyes pour. In her rush to save the Pilgrim’s food source, she forgot her lessons on breath control. Jedi fortitude sees her through all the same. Her pain is nothing if Kalikori starves.

She fends off the last of the Flesh Raider saboteurs and stumbles back, catching her breath. The devices are in pieces, and most of the crops look fine, too briefly exposed to do lasting damage.

Reporting back to Ranna, she projects confidence and reassurance, hiding the chills pooling in her stomach. It would pass.

“Since you came here, all you’ve done is risk your life over and over for people you don’t know,” Ranna says, smiling sadly, “you remind me of her, you know, she was strong and selfless too. I don’t know if I have that strength.”

“I believe in you, Ranna, you’re strong, capable, and a good person.” The response is natural; empathy outpacing her thoughts. “And I won’t let you down. I promise I’ll see this through.”

Ranna’s smile grows fonder. “I appreciate that. It’s just hard to be alone with all this, and I feel better knowing you’re here.”

There’s something about the way Ranna looks at her that makes a blush creep up her neck and K’Surda feels her throat close uselessly. Ranna continues, looking away. “That’s strange, isn’t it? I’ve only known you a little while, but you’re brave, honest, and you put others before yourself. I wish I could’ve met you sooner.”

Heat flushes her face. “That’s… very kind of you,” she sputters.

Ranna’s smile widens briefly with amusement, and she meets K’Surda’s gaze again. “Will you stay with me a while,” she asks, sobering, “at least until your master returns?” There’s an invitation to Ranna’s voice that makes her heart pull in two directions at once. Her ears burn.

K’Surda clears her throat, stumbling over her words and her feet as she backs away to the door. “I would, I-I’m sorry, I just—there’s things I still need to do around the village. You understand.”

Ranna nods, tries not to look disappointed, and K’Surda turns, quickly leaving before her face can melt away.

* * *

She cuts down the lightsaber-stealing Flesh Raider with a hard weight in her chest.

Another dead Jedi, another death that could have been avoided had the Order acted sooner and helped the Pilgrims. She picks up the fallen lightsaber and turns it over in her hands, staring at the Flesh Raider who wielded it. Her thoughts drift to the talkative Raider she helped enter the temple.

Another mistake she hopes she hasn’t made.

* * *

Moorint falls dead with his cohorts, and K’Surda can’t breathe. Her mind races with possibilities, her heart is heavy, and her hands shake on the grip on her blades. She doesn’t hear Ranna at first, staring at the innocent blood on the floor, frantically searching all her training for something she could’ve done differently to avoid it. She _tried_ to talk them down and they didn't listen.

She could have forced it, _compelled_ them to listen, persuade them that this course of action was suicide.

Her stomach curdles at the idea now as it did the first time she learned about that power. She could never wrap her head around how comfortable most Jedi seemed with using it, no matter how benign its usage. The notion of dominating someone’s free will, messing with their thoughts, forcing them to do things they didn’t want to—her stomach lurches.

She could have saved them from _themselves_.

“I’m sorry, my friend, I thought I could save my people. I wouldn’t have let anything happen to you.”

She slowly relaxes her grip on her weapons and mutters a platitude, a flat-toned acceptance of Ranna’s actions. Ranna begins to ask what she can do to make this right, and K’Surda turns on her with a speed that makes her flinch. “Where is my master?”

Ranna holds up her hands in a placating gesture that makes K’Surda flinch it turn, afraid she’s intimidating the smaller woman. “Bengel took him to a place called the Forge. I don’t know it, perhaps your droid does?”

K’Surda makes short work of reactivating T7. She desperately wants to be anywhere but Kalikori village.

* * *

It should feel triumphant to finally put an end to the threat but K’Surda only feels pity and sadness as Bengel tries to sway her to his broken way of seeing things. She doesn’t want power, so his words fall flat, but no one else is going to die today, certainly not by her hand.

His nose crunches under her knuckles. A follow-up blow to the temple lays him out cold. She takes her belt and secures his wrists behind his back, then takes his lightsaber away from him before checking on her master.

Orgus, thankfully, is fine. He grimaces and grumbles, but he brushes her off for fussing once he’s upright.

“You faced a challenge beyond any trial I could assign. There’s nothing more I can teach you.”

She’s dumbstruck when he gives her the parts to make her own lightsaber. It feels like she’s only been on Tython a week at most and part of her is unsure, but she takes the pieces from him and finds herself smiling with pride and excitement.

“Will he okay?” she asks, motioning to Bengel.

Orgus nods. “I’ll carry him back to the Jedi Temple and get him help. The horrors he witnessed on Coruscant broke him—destroyed the gentle Padawan I trained. But thanks to you he can recover, he deserves a second chance.”

Memories that aren’t hers rise to the surface, and she shakes them away. She can imagine all too well what Bengel saw and how much more horrifying it must have been in person. “I hope so,” she says, clutching the lightsaber components tight. “I won’t be long, stay safe on the way back.”

Orgus smiles drily and turns away, leaving her to the Forge.

* * *

“K’Surda! Is it true?”

Unaw’s voice snaps her out of her reverie. She turns away from the setting sun, framing Kalikori Village up on the ridge above the temple grounds.

“Is what true?” she asks, leaning against the balcony railing.

Unaw practically jumps on the spot, gesturing excitedly. “Your Knighthood! I heard from the other Padawans, your victory at the Forge, saving the Order, its all they can talk about!”

She blushes despite herself and rubs her neck. “Yeah. It’s true, and I was just as surprised.”

“How?! You acted like a Knight the moment you arrived!”

“I’m not sure about that. I just did what I thought was right, Unaw. I don’t think it’s anything more than that.”

He shakes his head as if exasperated by her answer and joins her at the balcony’s edge. “Well, I just wanted to wish you luck. You’re leaving soon, aren’t you?”

“You hear that from the Padawans too?”

“I overheard a couple of Masters talking about it.”

The temple practically _buzzing_ with news of her exploits was why she was standing on the balcony in the first place. Fewer people would notice her, and she would have a moment to think. But she refuses to let any irritation show and smiles at Unaw. “You seem to be in better spirits.”

He nods, squinting happily. “I have you to thank. I know you’ll probably be fine, but be careful on Coruscant. I’d hate to hear of anything happening to you.”

She holds out her hand, and he grasps it tightly. “So long as you promise to pass your trials too, the galaxy needs more Jedi.”

“I promise!”


	2. Bonus: The Esseles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> K'Surda has a safe and uneventful 15 hours in space.

“I bet you’ve travelled a lot, huh?”

T7 beeps affirmatively as they enter the lounge of the Esseles. It’s as nice a ship as the transport officer said. She wasn’t expecting Grand Master Shan to secure transport for her but she appreciates it nonetheless. Jedi education trained her in piloting but navigating intergalactic transport systems was another thing altogether.

She makes to settle down in a booth, intent on passing the next fifteen hours with some holobooks, only for another passenger to flag her down. A slender, blue Twilek woman with green eyes—there’s an air of nervousness about her that makes K’Surda adopt a confident, reassuring stance.

“I heard a rumour that there’s an Imperial warship following us.”

Rumour flies out the window when alarms blare and the Esseles rocks violently under turbo-laser assault, shorting several systems and sending most passengers tumbling to the floor. Fires break out; red warning lights bath the walls in an ominous glow, and the fear of those around her catches like kindling.

She wastes no time in sprinting for the bridge.

* * *

“If you attempt to stop my men from arresting Ambassador Asara, I will have every living thing aboard the Esseles killed.”

The fear curdles her stomach and hardens into resolve just as quickly. She knows who Kilran is, the Butcher of Coruscant was prominent in military tactics and recent history lessons, and she knows how he operates—mercilessly. She’s glad when First Officer Haken realises it too, that they have to fight back if they want to live, and she volunteers her skills to defend the ship.

It’s a visceral experience feeling her lightsaber cut through someone’s body. There’s some resistance on the torso, almost none on a limb. The smell of burned flesh is so much worse with a lightsaber.

She learns to tune that out as well, as best she can, because to let it trip her up is tantamount to failure, and lives depend on her.

The ease with which Asara suggests _sacrificing_ lives—murdering Salen and his engineers—almost knocks K’Surda off her feet, and she snarls that it’s absolutely out of the question. Her conviction shuts Asara up, for now.

* * *

Blood isn't a new taste. She licks it from her split lip in time for a medical droid to approach her with kolto on hand, and she sits on the stairs leading away from the bridge.

So far she’s fought dozens of war droids, Imperial soldiers, agents, and now a Mandalorian. The warrior people prided themselves on killing Jedi, and Ironfist almost succeeded in doing just that if not for T7 shooting the blaster from his hand.

It left him open for her to take his head from his shoulders.

She tries not to stare at it.

The new plan worries her as much as the last. It feels like stepping onto ever thinning branches to reach a prime piece of fruit. Not that they have much of a choice.

The kolto injection stings, so do the sutures—it’s bearable. Once she stops bleeding, she waves the droid away and heads for the turbo-lifts that will take her to the hangar.

Haken stops her at the lift doors and suggest something heinous, revenge for Asara’s own suggestion. She refuses to give him even the appearance of being interested and walks away.

* * *

To fight a real Sith is nothing like fighting Bengel Morr. The Sith knows the Dark Side intimately, knows what he’s doing, and his training shows throughout their duel. It shows in the ferocity of his attacks, the focused, knife-point hatred she feels bearing down on her with every blow.

It makes the air feel brittle and she clenches her teeth, pulls on all her training and strength to see her through. Calm and focus would see her through, she wouldn’t give in, she _couldn’t_ give in and let the Imperials have Asara or the Esseles.

She channels the Force through her blades and lands a powerful, spinning blow. The Sith’s guard breaks. He stumbles, unbalanced, and she quickly plunges her lightsabers into his chest.

Smoking hilts clatter to the floor. He sputters, wheezing as the blades burn through his ribs, and his caustic orange eyes lock into hers. The light goes out in them and she withdraws her weapons, heart hammering, and breath coming short. They had to leave—right now.

She turns and pulls Asara off the floor, marching her onto the shuttle.

* * *

_“ <<Jedi = okay?>>_”

She looks up from her holobook to see T7 watching her instead of the lounge and it takes her a moment to reflect. As soon as they were free and safe she found a quiet place to lie down and slept for eight hours, which did her a world of good in shaking off the tumultuous beginning, for the most part.

Another hour of meditation did the rest.

Her first brush with the Empire, and the Sith, came a lot sooner than she thought it would.

“I think so,” she says, frowning. “Do you think I did alright?”

T7 bounces from side to side, whistling. “ _< <Jedi = saved Esseles + Ambassador // Outcome = optimal!>>_”

She rubs her neck. “I feel like I could’ve… I don’t know what I could’ve done. Jedi are supposed to be peacekeepers but I don’t feel like I’ve been keeping much peace.”

“ _< <Protecting innocents = fighting + killing sometimes // Jedi = Protecting innocents>>_”

“That’s true. It just takes getting used to, I guess.”

“ _< <T7 = believes in Jedi // Jedi + T7 = unstoppable + save many lives!>>_”

She smiles at that and feels a little lighter. “Thanks, T7.”


	3. A Damn Fine Mess

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everything on Coruscant is fine. This is fine.

Kolto treatment before arrival leaves her with a faint scar on her lip and little else to show for the eventful trip. She doesn’t bring it up when Orgus meets her at the spaceport and takes her aside to a small café not far from the towering Senate building. Coruscant is staggering in size and density and she wonders how many people could possibly live here.

It occurs to her that the casualties incurred ten years ago couldn’t have been accurate. Layers upon layers of people must have been lost in the wreckage and chaos of it all, bodies that would never be found.

Her stomach twists.

“I heard your journey was a little rough. You alright, kid?”

She looks up from warming her hands around a sweet and creamy cup of caf to meet Orgus’s questioning stare.

“You heard?”

Orgus smiles drily at her. “News travelled fast. Imperials are denying it of course and the Senate is gridlocked, but the holonet’s buzzing about a hero Jedi who fought them off and saved the day.”

K’Surda rubs her neck, all words fleeing her grasp. Orgus waits a moment before asking, “is it true you faced a Sith?”

She purses her lips and nods. “He refused to back down. I killed him.”

Orgus nods and pats her shoulder, prompting her to walk out of the café with him. “I knew I had a good feeling about you.”

* * *

She still isn’t sure what to make of Kira. There’s something hard and flinty to her eyes that K’Surda has trouble placing, and she has more trouble placing it when Kira notices her staring and smirks at her.

It’s like a Nexu issuing a challenge and it causes heat to creep up her neck. 

K’Surda looks away, focusing her attention elsewhere as the Masters talk about what to do about this ‘planet prison’ business.

Kira returns her attention to the conversation, her lips still quirked in amusement.

* * *

Coruscant disappoints the longer K’Surda spends peeling back its increasingly ghoulish layers. It galls her to see Senators breaking their own laws or dealing in corruption, and it angers her to realise how many of them do it because the system is broken.

She tries to feel sure in telling the truth about Senator Kayle but at the back of her mind doubt worms, asking her if it was worth it, if she should have any faith at all in the process when greedy, selfish people clamour to replace Kayle. She pushes those thoughts away, because of course it was worth it, she’s a Knight of the Republic, and she has to stand up for its ideals even when it’s inconvenient or painful.

The Migrant Merchants Guild wanted homes for their people, refugees with nothing and nowhere else to go. Kayle shouldn’t have taken advantage of them.

Maybe if she reminds herself of that enough times it will feel right, but she doubts that too, and all it leaves her feeling is slimy.

* * *

She takes it in stride when Orgus and Kiwiiks leave to deal with the Republic’s lost weapons. A Knight should handle responsibility as easy as breathing.

It’s hard not to worry, however. More projects of terrible and wicked potential, all for the war effort no doubt. She isn’t sure how to feel about that beyond her initial horror at both their existence and their discovery.

It must be very easy to use horrible weapons on a target you’ve already decided is monstrous. The Republic decided that a long time ago when it and the Jedi Order went to the Sith worlds after they were already defeated and decimated them on the then Chancellor’s orders, all but wiping them out.

She can’t help but wonder how the Imperials see them after that.

* * *

Coruscant’s depth makes her skin itch.

Being unable to see the sky despite the unnatural cavernous spaces stretching out above her is an ominous feeling at best. It makes her long for the days of her childhood where she would run and climb through the canyons of her home, the twin suns glare skating across the plateaus.

Nonetheless, K’Surda persists and reminds herself that it isn’t forever.

Nothing is.

* * *

“Hey, you in there?” Kira’s voice snaps her out of her thoughts and she sits up in the taxi, gathering herself.

“Sorry, I was thinking,” she said, rubbing her neck.

Kira arches a brow at her. “Yeah, I could see that. Credit for your thoughts?”

“Tarnis.”

“Ah.”

“I know Sith are master manipulators and all that but to see it in person. I mean, did you feel anything off about him?”

A sour look creases Kira’s face and she looks away, glaring at their increasingly dark and cavernous metal surroundings on their way down to Justicar territory. “No.”

“And neither did our Masters from the looks of it.”

“That really bites, you know? They’re supposed to be better than that.”

K’Surda hunches her shoulders. “Maybe, but we can focus on stopping him now.”

Kira smiles drily. “Can’t wait to see his face when we catch up.”

* * *

It all rushes back the instant she steps out of the lift.

The chorus of clashing lightsabers, the roar of falling rubble, the stink of burned flesh, and the heat of the fire—people screaming, blood everywhere, panic so thick it chokes the air as much as the smoke.

K’Surda stumbles and falls to her knees, drenched in a cold sweat.

“Woah, what’s with you?”

She can’t answer Kira, she’s too busy swallowing bile. Her stomach lurches in protest and she focuses on breathing, slow and deep.

Being in the temple almost feels like desecration, like there should be ashes and bones under her feet. K’Surda shakes it off, breathes again, and stands.

Kira stands with her arms crossed, looking alarmed. “What was _that_?”

“I’ll explain later, we have to stop Tarnis.”

* * *

_“I will inflict unimaginable suffering on your people. Billions will die because of you.”_

She bluffs her way through Angral’s snarling and does her best to appear unflappable because to give these Sith the pleasure of seeing her afraid is unacceptable. She commits each face to memory, lingering on the Pureblood man, but the only one she recognises is Angral for his part in the Sacking.

A small part of her hopes he isn’t able to repeat destruction on that scale.

A larger part knows it will be so much worse if she lets him run unchecked.

* * *

With things going the way they are, K’Surda fully expects to travel by starship again, just not by _her own_ personal starship. She spends most of the thirty hour trip to Ord Mantell getting familiar with the Defender’s layout and systems, smiling now and then because the whole thing feels surreal.

Now that she thinks about it, the last fortnight has felt a little surreal. She arrived on Tython an advanced student after a decade of hard work, training and honing, bouncing from various teachers while she gained control of her nightmares and her connection to the Force. Maybe it shouldn’t be a surprise that she could face down the likes of Bengel Morr, Kilran’s dogs, or a Darth’s son.

She was always strong in the Force and always took her training seriously.

Even so, it’s a lot to take in, and a lot of pressure, but she can take it. She has to—[the Republic and everyone living in it is counting on her](https://64.media.tumblr.com/aa77c100e6ca340c95052c46bfeb867c/84e4e580ee9e572f-38/s1280x1920/a4c1b38dc03eca791153fe9c7e7eb3dbc3ffa068.jpg). But duty can wait until they arrive.

In need of some caf she walks into the galley to find Kira searching through the cabinets, muttering curses.

“Something wrong?”

“Only the slim pickings we’ve got here,” Kira drawls. “Next time we get the chance we should stock up on the good stuff.”

K’Surda smiles and leans against the doorframe, crossing her arms. “And what do you define as ‘good stuff?’”

A smirk curls Kira’s lips. “Waffles, ice cream, chocolate, you know the purely nutritional fare. Oh and real coffee.”

K’Surda can’t help but laugh a genuine, warm, from the stomach laugh and it feels like the first time she’s laughed in months. “I promise, next time we’re docked somewhere with a decent store, we’ll get all that. I actually love ice cream.”

Kira grins and her eyes twinkle. “Who doesn’t? Sith, that’s who.”

K’Surda laughs again. “Okay, get out of the way and I’ll wrangle together something nice.”

Kira moves out of the galley with a theatrical sweep of her arms. “By all means, work some magic. I’ll provide moral support.”

Huffing in amusement, K’Surda gets to work, and for the first time in two weeks feels completely relaxed.


	4. Watchers and Rakghouls

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Getting mauled by rakghouls is perfectly safe.

“So, did they pluck you fully formed out of a Jedi mould or what?” asks Kira. She keeps watch on their surroundings for any sign of movement while K’Surda packs. Taris is a wild, broken place full of dangers neither of them were expecting.

“What?” K’Surda looks up from latching Vidas’s toolbox to the speeder.

Kira glances at her. “Well, the kids on Coruscant, the refugees here, you’re so… earnest,” she pauses and shakes her head. “Sorry, that sounds like an insult, I don’t mean it like that.”

K’Surda raises an eyebrow. She moves to secure Leisha’s digging tools to the speeder. “And how did you mean it?”

“I don’t know. You’re genuine and enthusiastic and you don’t have a stick up your ass.”

“Like?”

“Off the top of my head or do you want a list?”

K’Surda snorts and shakes her head. “I didn’t take it as an insult.”

Kira looks at her, smiling. “Good, because I know I suck at this. Are we done?”

“Yeah, let’s head back.”

* * *

K’Surda sympathises with Godera’s anger at the Republic, to a point. Abandoning it in the aftermath is another matter.

A great mind like his could have created all manner of solutions to the problems faced by the rebuilding or turned his intellect to more defensive pursuits to keep the Republic people safe.

Perhaps she would have felt the same had she seen it in person, or if the Jedi never found her to help her work through the nightmares. Maybe she would have joined the Republic military, sought revenge for the horrors witnessed.

She likes to think she wouldn’t have.

* * *

The rakghoul’s teeth sink into her forearm and K’Surda swallows the yell that tries to escape. She quickly beheads the thing before it can do anything else. The head drops off with a wet thud and her arm bleeds profusely from two rows of punctures.

“Don’t forget to breathe,” Kira reminds her, quickly binding the wound with a kolto wrap.

K’Surda nods, hand clenched, already focusing inward, tuning in to her heartbeat, the flow of blood, the burning heat of metabolism as oxygen enters her system—she can feel the virus attempting to propagate.

But it’s only an attempt. Her arm burns with pain, sweat pours down her face, and her heart pounds at first but the more she focuses the calmer it beats. The virus struggles to get very far in its consumption of her body.

She can’t tell right away if it’s the serum or her own control, and she doesn’t want to overestimate herself so it must be the serum.

“Okay,” she murmurs, releasing a slow, deep breath. “I think it’s working so we should get to Brell before I throw up.” Kira looks visibly relieved at that and K’Surda grins at her through the sweat. “I’m kidding.”

Kira rolls her eyes. “I’ll believe that next time you eat and keep it down, let’s go.”

* * *

The overgrown ruins of Taris make her think of a giants graveyard, broken ribs made of skyscrapers and spines of fallen ships. The rakghouls are bodily parasites crawling over the corpses, digging through still rotting flesh and tearing at fresh bodies.

It inspires morbidity with an ease that leaves K’Surda purposefully concentrating on the nicer aspects, the beauty of the overgrown foliage in sunlight, the grace of grazing wildlife—there are things to appreciate on Taris but they fall few and far between.

The sooner they leave it behind the better.

* * *

_“Farewell, Jedi.”_

The visual of Watcher One calmly injecting himself with lethal poison burns into her mind and K’Surda stares at his body, mouth open, struggling for words. She’s never seen someone commit suicide before, least of all for a cause, and of all causes he did it _for the Empire._

He could have survived.

 _She_ could have stopped him, pulled the injector from his hand, had she not been so caught up in wondering what he intended to do.

She just didn’t expect it.

She shakes the thought away and moves to release Doctor Godera.

At least Watcher One couldn’t get anything out of him…

* * *

Duty pulls her in two directions at the Oralis Spaceport. On one hand, they have Godera, their next course of action should be to leave and head for Nar Shaddaa. But Governor Saresh needs their help and if she doesn't want the last week of pain, sweat, and bug bites to be for nothing she is going to march back out there and do everything in her power to help.

K’Surda sighs a string of curses under her breath.

* * *

The prospect of Force-sensitive rakghouls is terrifying at first, but the fear serves nothing so she pushes it away.

The rakghouls never asked to be created, no child does. If there was even the slightest chance that these ‘Nekghouls’ could learn a better way and someday find a new place on Taris as equals, she wasn’t going to destroy that chance.

* * *

The Governor wishes her good luck and K’Surda breathes a sigh of relief, as does Kira. They trudge back to the Defender, sore, stiff, covered in swamp grime, and it’s in the lift to their hangar that Kira mutters;

“We still don’t have any ice cream.”

K’Surda laughs a little.

“We’ll stop somewhere on the way.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Taris wasn't particularly juicy RE writing for me but there were still some things of note for K'Surda.


	5. Merciful Moon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nar Shaddaa is just a terrible place for everyone.

A quick stopover at a trade station finally stocks their cabinets with a wider variety of foodstuffs, including Kira’s requested ‘nutritional fare.’ Small comforts between missions are important for keeping their energy and morale up and they find themselves settling into a friendly routine while travelling the two and a half days it’ll take them to reach Nar Shaddaa.

C2 handles breakfast as neither K’Surda nor Kira are particularly alive in the morning. They meditate together, spar a few times, and go through a couple of training sessions, one for physical health and another for control in the Force. Then K’Surda handles lunch, they review what’s going on in the galaxy through the Holonet and secure channels, and the rest of the ‘afternoon’ and ‘evening’ aboard the ship is free time until dinner, which K’Surda also handles because she enjoys cooking.

They’re set reach Nar Shaddaa by tomorrow and whatever horrible project the Republic had hidden away in such a lawless place, so they spend the night watching a film through the holoterminal.

Kira won the dice roll so they’re watching an action-comedy about a team of daring archaeologists and their quick-witted leader discovering a long-buried danger.

It wouldn’t have been her first choice but K’Surda finds herself enjoying it, as does T7, though he chimes in occasionally to point out an inaccuracy that both of them hurriedly shush him for.

Late in the film while they’re thoroughly enthralled, they both reach for the bowl of snacks at the same time and bump hands. K’Surda stalls and Kira snatches the bowl.

“Too slow,” Kira says, smirking at her. K’Surda laughs, momentarily struck by the mischievous twinkle in her eyes. It occurs to her that Kira is really pretty when she’s this relaxed and K’Surda lets her have the snacks without a fight.

She doesn’t give the thought any weight. She can think Kira is pretty without it meaning anything.

It won’t be a problem.

* * *

Nar Shaddaa reminds K’Surda of the shadiest, most crime-ridden areas in Coruscant, only here it’s everywhere. An entire planet of lawlessness—well, there had to be some kind of control. Rules enforced by the Hutts, gang leaders, criminal warlords and kingpins that stepped on everyone else too powerless to fight it.

Nothing made that clearer than being flagged down by a frightened member of the Republic’s Diplomatic Corp because his bodyguards were shot dead in the middle of the street in full view of everyone.

It makes K’Surda’s stomach harden thinking about how many people need help on this planet alone and how little any one person could do for them. She knows she can’t get bogged down in that, she has a mission, and she has to carry it out before the Empire can exploit what the Republic did here. But she’ll do what she can along the way to make life easier for some, at the very least.

* * *

She wants to argue with Chief Rieeken, she has a bad feeling about their safety, especially with Agent Tander reporting that only half their field agents responded to his signal. Watcher One knew about her handling Bengel on Tython and fooled her on Taris, Tarnis fooled _everyone_ around him including two Jedi Masters—neither Angral nor his minions were to be underestimated.

It’s Rieeken’s call, however.

K’Surda just hopes he doesn’t come to regret it.

* * *

_“They jumped at the chance.”_

Because they were angry, afraid, and hurt, and the Power Guard Project preyed on those feelings, gave the refugees an easy answer to their pain. Convinced to let themselves become lab experiments in the hopes that the Empire will suffer as they suffered when it’s over.

K’Surda can only feel pity for them. They deserved safety and healing, not to be exploited and killed in the name of revenge, or to be convinced what they were doing was heroic instead of tragic and self-destructive.

Her thoughts drift to Bengel Morr, how he must be doing, if he’s making progress, and she hopes he is, despite the pain and horror of the things he saw all those years ago.

The thought of what might have happened had the Sith found him in that state is borderline unbearable.

* * *

“Honestly, someone else walking around with my face makes my skin crawl,” Kira says around a mouthful of fried street food. “We should’ve just cut that creep down where he stood.”

“Maybe,” K’Surda says with a shake of her head, “but we needed his intel on which soldiers were replaced. That would’ve died with him.”

“That’s true. Still blasted creepy.”

“You’ll get no argument from me on that. I hope he goes away for the rest of his life.”

Kira is quiet for a long enough moment for K’Surda to ask, “what’s wrong?”

A sour look crosses Kira’s face. “Think we’ll find Galen alive?”

The question drops a cold rock in K’Surda’s stomach and she tries to answer affirmatively, but she can’t. Sadik’s answer, that he had done something ‘wondrous’ to Galen, was confirmation enough that something horrible had happened to the man.

K’Surda sighs, “I don’t know.”

Kira nods. “Yeah, thought as much.”

* * *

Rieeken’s assertion that there are no innocent people in the Red Light Sector troubles her. It feels more like a convenient lie than fact—not everyone in Red Light is there by choice. Many people on the whole of Nar Shaddaa aren’t here by choice. Some are by circumstance, or by force. Do slaves and indentured workers or people with the poor luck of being born here not count as innocents?

The dismissal is probably easy for a man like Rieeken, doing the job he does. Making things simple is a mercy for him.

No such luck for her.

* * *

The agents leave their ruined safehouse, blood and bodies everywhere—the Powerguards made short work of them.

K’Surda fixates on Rieeken’s corpse, his jaw dislocated and a large gash in his temple. His head rests in a pool of his own blood.

She should have forced the matter. She should have argued.

She should have told them what they were facing.

Guilt gnaws at her insides and she clenches her hands. There’s nothing she can do for the dead, she has to move forward.

On to the Industrial Sector and whatever nightmare has befallen Galen.

* * *

The smell of burning fat and flesh makes her stomach lurch, and the bones piled high behind Commander Verghost, Evocii skulls of every size, every age—K’Surda cuts him down before she can think.

Evil.

He was evil, completely and utterly, a monster wearing the skin of a man.

And he lies dead at her feet, taking his knowledge with him.

She tries to tell herself it was worth it, that she couldn’t let him live for all the harm he had caused, the malevolence he intended to commit. Whatever he knew wasn’t enough to outweigh handing him over as a prisoner of war, to possibly return to the Imperials in some exchange.

K’Surda knows she’s just trying to convince herself when she let her anger and disgust at Verghost’s actions overrule her.

Kira stops her as they leave the Labour District with a hand on her arm and K’Surda freezes, expecting confrontation.

“Hey, you did the right thing.”

She blinks, shock written plainly on her face. Kira looks at her seriously. “I mean it. He didn’t deserve to live. Some people just don’t deserve that chance and not everyone can turn a new leaf.”

“He could have told us where the other camps were.”

“Maybe, but he could’ve been lying. He could have been telling the truth just to get you to spare him and when he’s sitting in an interrogation room he clams up. Point is, now he can’t hurt anyone, ever. I’d call that a win.”

K’Surda nods slowly, not quite believing it, but she appreciates Kira trying. “Thanks.”

Kira smiles drily. “No problem. Let’s keep moving, yeah?”

* * *

Tears stream down Galen’s face, anguished and relieved in equal measure, as her lightsaber pierces his heart.

“Thank you,” he whispers in a cybernetic rasp and collapses with a heavy thud of violating machinery.

[The lightsaber shakes in her hand](https://64.media.tumblr.com/9cb64434bb74ecc8f221d9ecdc076a99/1a7a2c73b1633398-05/s1280x1920/5557eb993f74a74644898b0a0a06606f932c9323.jpg).

She blinks away the sting in her eyes and clenches her jaw, swallowing hard to dislodge the sharp, choking tangle in her throat.

“Come on,” she mutters, her voice thick. “We have a Sith Lord to find.”

* * *

She sits freshly showered at the dining table, head in her hands, a cold cup of caf in front of her.

_“I know you’re probably exhausted, but the enemy hasn’t given up. Neither can we.”_

Var Suthra’s words rattle around her head and K’Surda sighs deeply, straightening. She picks up the caf and washes it out, setting the cup aside to dry.

Kira was handling their exploits on Nar Shaddaa remarkably well, in fact their new destination seems to bother her far more but K’Surda can’t blame her. It feels off, but Var Suthra is right, until they know for sure they have to treat it like a genuine attempt at defection.

She shakes her head and stalks away to her room to meditate.


	6. Bonus: The Emperor's Children

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Valis is a dick and now he's a dead dick.

The atmosphere aboard the abandoned mining station feels sour as they step through the airlock. Enough power to leave the life support online and a few lights, but little else, and the darkness all but closes on them like a swarm of jaws.

“This doesn’t feel right,” K’Surda mutters.

“No, it sure doesn’t,” Kira responds, taking half a step back towards the Defender. “We should get out of here.”

K’Surda looks at her, frowning. “We have to make sure.”

Kira grimaces. “Yeah, I guess so, but I’ll be watching our backs all the same. You first.”

K’Surda nods and walks into the dark, oppressive gullet of the mining station, the back of her neck prickling.

* * *

Valis falls dead at their feet and K’Surda is breathless. She stares at Kira, questioning, seeking—a Child of the Emperor.

“We need to talk,” she says sharply, “on the ship.”

Kira just nods, staring at Valis’s body with the posture of a cornered animal.

K’Surda can’t blame her.

* * *

She finds Kira in the galley again, nursing a mug of tea. She clears her throat and Kira looks at her guiltily, tries to leave without saying anything, but K’Surda stops her.

“I meant what I said, Kira,” she says. “I don’t care where you came from, or what they meant for you to be. You’re a good person, a good Jedi, and if the council thinks where you came from is a problem I’ll fight them over them. You deserve a chance to prove them wrong.”

Kira looks flustered by this and doesn’t meet her eyes.

“I appreciate that, I do. This is all just really difficult. I hoped I would never see any of them again.”

K’Surda steps out of the way. “I know. I just… I’m here for you, okay? If you want to talk, or meditate, or blow off steam, come find me.”

Kira smiles sombrely. “I know. You’re a good person too, you know. Thanks.” She touches K’Surda’s arm in passing and turns the tips of her ears pink.

* * *

She bristles at Master Kaeden’s hostility towards Kira. It’s undeserved and irrational, his hatred for the Sith makes him blind to Kira’s sincerity. She doesn’t say that, but she does vouch for Kira, standing up to his assertions that she should be locked up and forever barred from graduating to Knighthood, all because of where she came from.

How dare he try to deny her that chance?

“Isn’t being a Jedi about forgiveness and compassion, about mercy? Kira didn’t have a choice in where or to whom she was born, but she chose to turn her back on it, she risked death to escape it and ended up here, with us. She’s given me zero reasons to doubt her motives and I trust her with my life. She—blast, _anyone_ who turns away from that deserves better from us, we’re supposed to be better than the enemy. If we make it too hostile to do so, how can we expect any of them to embrace the Light?”

He almost appears shamed by that, if barely, but the rest of the present council is certainly moved.

She refuses to look away from Master Kaeden until Satele closes the council meeting, granting the two them of them her blessing to continue their mission unimpeded by Kira’s past.

It’s a weight off both their shoulders.

* * *

They talk again, honestly this time, over bowls of ice cream.

They talk about Kira’s escape from Korriban, her life on Nar Shaddaa, and how she met Master Kiwiiks. K’Surda is quiet for most of it, just letting Kira talk at length about it all, the parts she cares to go into detail about.

It seems freeing for her, being able to talk to someone who won’t judge her about her past, and K’Surda is more than happy to be that person. She wants Kira to feel at ease and supported, purely in the interest of her advancement as a Jedi, and nothing to do with the way her relaxed smile—the first time K’Surda has seen that expression on her—makes K’Surda feel light and warm.

Nothing to do with that at all.


	7. Home Turf

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> K'Surda comes home again and leaves a different person.

She feels numb on the descent to Tatooine. It’s the first time she’s been here since she left a decade ago and it’s at risk of being destroyed by a Republic weapon. She doesn’t believe Var Suthra’s claim that they didn’t realise how powerful the Shock Drum could be. They designed it, planets have been destroyed before, through disaster, through intentional malice, they had to know how powerful it was and what its capabilities were went they built it.

And it’s on her home world.

Her mothers are still here, and out of reach. She can’t contact them. Adogha Village only has enough technology to make things easier, there’s no holocommunication, and she’s not supposed to contact them anyway, even if their lives are at risk.

A good Jedi didn’t keep attachments like that.

She holds her necklace again.

* * *

“So this is where you came from, huh?” Kira asks her as they walk through Anchorhead. Sunlight bounces off the white buildings until they look like quartz.

“Not here exactly, I didn’t grow up in the invader colonies,” the words label leaves her mouth before she can think and Kira gives her an odd look. “Invader colonies?”

She hunches her shoulders, sighing. “Sorry, being here is kind of bringing it all back to me.” She looks away from the sandy streets and dirty militia patrolling them, and focuses on Kira. The red colour of her hair is especially vibrant in Tatooine’s intense sunlight and K’Surda swallows. “One of my mothers, Surda, was raised by the native people, the Ghorfa. You’ll hear everyone else call them Tusken Raiders, or Sand People.”

“Her name is _Surda_?”

“Yes, the K at the start of _my_ name means ‘daughter of.”

Kira nods thoughtfully. “Huh, so you were raised with them too?”

K’Surda shakes her head. “No. Mama was pushed out when a problem in the tribe boiled over. There was a lot of tension over ‘rescues’ like mama, orphans the Ghorfa take in from their raids, so she left. She wandered for a while before she met others like her, people who were raised by the Ghorfa and left for one reason or another, and they founded a village together for outcasts and exiles from the tribes. Not long after that, she met Adora, my mother.”

“So the invader thing?”

“It was the way of things. Off-worlders come here to stake a claim, they take land and resources, and they never ask, no one does—so the Ghorfa fight them. And people put bounties on the natives, they form hunting parties to clear out the ‘savages’ and ‘civilize’ the place.”

K’Surda clenches her hands, scowling, and she shakes her head again. “I hated it when they talked liked that back on Tython, you know? About the Flesh Raiders, as if they were pests to be exterminated, like it wasn’t _their_ home before we arrived.”

Sympathy softened Kira’s features. “I can see why it bothered you,” she says, and puts a hand on K’Surda’s arm, causing her to relax. “Your family will be okay, I believe in us.”

She feels her ears turning pink and she nods gratefully. “So will Master Kiwiiks, I promise.”

Kira smiles and it brightens everything around her.

* * *

Carefully navigation brings them to the Shock Drum facility without incident, perched on the edge of the Jundland, and crawling with Ghorfa intent on tearing the place apart, another sign of encroaching colonisation to be destroyed.

K’Surda stares through her electrobinoculars, noting at least two dozen warriors, and the one who seems to command the most respect. His robes, decorated with trophies from skulls, claws, and teeth, to insignias ripped from all manner of uniform, marks him clearly as a war master. He passes under the ledge Kira and her occupy and K’Surda rises to her full height. She draws in a deep breath, pushes her throat as low as possible, and belts out in perfect Tusken:

_“My name is K’Surda, and I challenge you to rahk’aghka!”_

The war master’s head, and every other Ghorfa head, snaps up to look at her and despite her very much human appearance, her words do their job in staying their hands. She knows how to speak their language, her name carries their customs, and she demands a duel with their strongest warrior.

A rahk’aghka was meant for disputes between tribes, a way to settle differences without killing each other in open battle, wasting resources and people in an environment where neither could be squandered.

“ _An outsider who speaks our tongue like she was born to it—what tribe are you, soft thing?”_ the commander snarls at her, pulling his gaderffi, as decorated as him.

K’Surda keeps her hands visible. _“My mother was of the Demonbane tribe. I am spirit-touched and left to train, now I return because our home is at risk. There is a terrible weapon hidden by outsiders, it can shake the ground so viciously that it can destroy the planet—surely you have felt the ground quakes?”_

He straightens at that, lowering his weapon a little. _“We have felt them growing over the last three days. You say this is outsider doing?”_

She nods. _“Yes, but I need to know where it is, and that building may hold the answers I need to stop it. I need you to fall back, at least for now, so I can do that. When I am done, I will not intervene again. This is still my home, and I know who it belongs to.”_

The war master regards her for a long moment and fully lowers his gaderffi. _“You call for rahk’aghka, you speak to us, you know our ways—you pledge that you speak the truth? That you mean to stop this cataclysm?”_

K’Surda jumps from the ledge, using the Force to land safely twenty feet down. She approaches the war master slowly and offers her left hand without hesitation. He grunts approvingly and produces a small, black flint knife from his belt. He grabs her offered hand and quickly pricks the centre of her palm, doing the same to himself, before he clasps their hands together where the blood can mingle.

She holds his hand tight, staring him in the face until a drop of their blood falls on the sand. The war master grunts and pulls back. _“Very well, spirit walker, we will relent for now and return when the quakes have stopped.”_ He turns away and begins shouting at his warriors to round everyone up for the journey home.

K’Surda breathes a deep sigh of relief, and hopes that she can do as promised.

* * *

Neither of them are quite sure how to react to or feel about Lord Praven, but they agree it’s strange of him to not only tell them the codes have changed but to offer the new ones should K’Surda win a duel against him.

Kira is extremely suspicious, and so is K’Surda, but time is precious and they have no alternative, so they follow the coordinates Praven gave them.

* * *

K’Surda holds her lightsaber at the ready, staring Praven down as he knelt at the edge of the mesa, ready for the end. He accepts it with grace and finality, and unnerving calm. It’s incongruous, antithetical to everything she knows of Sith.

He is Sith and he isn’t. Not like Angral, or Sadic, and so she hesitates, wonders if this is the right way to end it. She showed mercy to Bengel Morr, and Ako Domi, but they were Jedi, wounded by their experiences, twisted by them into becoming something they were not, by the Sith.

Praven was ready to let Tatooine be destroyed, to kill millions, to kill her family, perform genocide. He tortured Master Kiwiiks and left her to die an agonising death.

He _is_ Sith.

K’Surda clenches her jaw and swings, cleaving through his neck.

Praven’s headless body tips over the edge of the mesa and the sight hit her with a feeling of heaviness, knotting her stomach.

She pushes it down and turns away, a cold sweat beading on her brow.

She still had to stop the Shock Drum.

* * *

“What are those things?” Kira hisses behind her.

“Sand Demons,” K’Surda mutters, crouching low as she observes the nest. The cavernous mine shook all around them in waves, and the waves grew faster by the minute, shaking free dust and rocks from the ceiling with worrying frequency. “My mother’s tribe took the name Demonbane from hunting them. Sand Demons hunt _Krayt Dragons_.”

Kira groans, “wonderful.”

K’Surda rose and drew her sabers. “We don’t have time to do this delicately, come on!”

* * *

Tatooine is safe, the Shock Drum buried, and Master Kiwiiks is alive—all in all, the mission was a success. Yet she lies awake in her quarters, holding her necklace, because the image of Praven’s body tumbling over the edge keeps her awake with its questions.

She keeps wondering ‘what if,’ and second-guessing, and every time she can’t help but regret and talk herself in circles because what he did, what he almost let happen, it forced her hand the same way Commander Verghost’s despicable acts did.

But Praven wasn’t Verghost, he wasn’t Angral, and she cut him down all the same when she could have extended her hand in mercy.

For someone so concerned with honour, he may well have made a good Jedi one day, if not for her.

She rolls on her side and tries in vain to sleep again.


	8. The Lost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> K'Surda has a terrible time on Alderaan.

It takes them nearly five days to get to Alderaan from Tatooine and the routine they’ve settled into serves them well for most of it. K’Surda finds herself distracted the closer they get to their destination, however, she feels tense and isn’t sure why.

Worried about her Master, perhaps, but she convinces herself that he’ll be fine.

Master Kiwiiks survived her mission, Orgus would too, she would make sure of it.

She wouldn’t fail him.

* * *

After the nightmarish cyborg soldiers and planet destroying capabilities of the shock drum, K’Surda isn’t as horrified by the single target precision of the Death Mark, but she’s nonetheless repulsed by the capacity to murder an unwitting target at any range. Anyone could be a target.

She knows the Republic does things she disagrees with, she’s seen plenty of proof of that and the only reason she knows about these weapons projects is because they were stolen by the enemy. The Republic probably wouldn’t have involved the Jedi at all otherwise.

And they would have continued these projects.

The Republic would have deployed their walking body horrors.

Planted the Shock Drum on a world they would justify the destruction of.

Assassinated people they would say deserved it, whether that was true or not.

All she can do now is stop the Imperials from exploiting the Republic’s darker impulses.

She has to save it from itself.

* * *

She stares at the smoking pile of ashes where Count Alde stood not two seconds ago, struggling to breathe with the air knocked out of her. She props herself up on her elbows, watching wisps of smoke escape his remains, and slowly lifts her head to look at the fist sized hole in the high ceiling of Organa Palace, a pinprick of morning sunlight.

_He’s dead. He’s dead and there’s nothing you can do about it. Get up._

Her thoughts pull in two directions, the Count, and her Master. Tears sting her eyes again and she blinks them away. She feels sick, imagining Orgus being stabbed in the back by a Sith makes her stomach boil, underhanded, cowardly—she clenches her hands.

_You’re a Jedi. Get. Up._

She pushes to her feet and finally hears Kira’s voice at her side.

“Are you okay?”

K’Surda doesn’t look at her. She stares at the ashes, knuckles white.

This evil couldn’t be allowed to continue, either through the Death Mark, or the Alderaanian throne.

* * *

Another world, another native species fighting for control of its planet—K’Surda is getting sick of seeing it. She’s sicker seeing it on a planet ostensibly on the Republic’s side, at least if House Organa claims the throne.

She remembers the alien refugees on Taris and how they fled after the Sacking of Coruscant, abused and forgotten by an overwhelmingly human government.

The Killiks with their off-putting insectoid appearance are probably very easy to write off as half-sapient savages. Or animals.

That explains the sheer brutality of the ‘pain factory,’ the misery so entrenched in the walls that it leeches out of them like fetid blood and makes her want to throw up.

She refuses to let the agony of this place spread.

“You don’t think of anyone but yourself do you?”

Keikana’s words send a roiling heat through her body and she snarls at the researcher’s imperious, judgemental scowl.

“If you’re so determined to become just like Ulgo then what is the point of fighting them?!” she snaps, “they committed unspeakable horrors here but you want to follow them! Do you hear yourself? You want to do the exact same thing they were doing because the terror, pain, and misery of another living creature matters so little to you? Fuck you!”

She shuts the holocall off and takes a moment to calm her breathing, all but shaking, only for Kira to lay a hand on her shoulder. K’Surda nearly jumps and looks at her to find an understanding smile on her face.

“It’s okay, we’ll slag the computers here before we head back,” she said, smirking. “Never thought I’d hear you swear like that, I’m kind of impressed.”

A very different kind of heat floods her face and K’Surda clears her throat. “Yes, well… I’m sorry, she got to me. I know I shouldn’t have lashed out like that. A good Jedi shouldn’t do that.”

“Hey, don’t apologise. You were right. This shouldn’t be repeated, ever.”

“Thank you.”

* * *

“You’re alive!” she can’t help but grin at the sight of Orgus, ragged though he is. His robes are signed and there’s a burn slashed into his cheek where the tip of a lightsaber barely touched him. [But he’s alive](https://64.media.tumblr.com/580b8f9405f05a0908a4e64c144e420a/79412747d8a45047-28/s1280x1920/65c1e9950b24a1eec88d8fb9b2d4867d3c9099b0.jpg).

“Easy there, kid,” Orgus grumbles, “act too surprised and you’ll hurt my feelings.”

She laughs a little but straightens her face. “Sorry, I’m just glad to see you is all.”

He smiles drily. “The feeling’s mutual. Want to fill me in on your side of things?”

* * *

“You look like you’re trying to play a master game of pazaak in your head, what’s up?” Kira looks at her with worry and K’Surda shakes her head, stares at the snow-capped mountains around them because her thoughts threaten to close her throat.

“I didn’t like how he said ‘our destinies part here.’ Like he knew something he wasn’t willing to share. It feels like something awful is going to happen.”

“I felt that too, but we have our assignment. Let’s just hope that feeling is a fluke, yeah?”

“Yeah, sure.”

* * *

It felt bad enough being _told_ Orgus was dead, but there was some distance from it, a detachment that came with someone telling her second-hand what supposedly happened to her master.

 _Watching_ Angral run Orgus through is a completely different beast and the sight brings K’Surda to her knees, her mind rushing back to Tython in an instant and the moment she first met him. He saw something in her that pushed passed the pain of losing Bengel and put so much faith in her that it pushed her to be better, to become the Knight he so readily believed her capable of becoming.

And he was dead, slain by the Darth _she_ angered, revenge for the son _she_ killed.

So many people were suffering because of her—just as he said they would.

Orgus’s body slumps to the floor of Angral’s ship, spine severed, a hole burned through the centre of his body—she feels his death hit her like an ice pick in the chest.

The boiling heat comes rushing back and she surges to her feet, lightsabers ignited, teeth bared.

Lord Nefarid wasn’t leaving here alive.

* * *

K’Surda manages to keep her composure carrying out the remainder of her obligations on Alderaan, saving House Panteer, ensuring Republic victory with key strikes against Thul and the Imperials, bringing the Ulgo usurper to justice—something to focus on lets her distract herself.

It’s only until she’s back on the ship, and talking to Var Suthra, when she learns that Angral left Orgus’s body floating in space like a worthless piece of jetsam that something breaks through and her voice cracks. But she clears it quickly, she can’t afford to break.

Jedi who break become something terrible, and too many people count on her to deal with Angral’s violence head-on.

She can’t allow herself to break.


	9. The Hero of Tython

Uphrades, a world devoted entirely to farming, peaceful, of no threat, home to sixteen million farmers and agricultural scientists who provided almost half of Coruscant’s food.

And it’s burning.

Entire chunks of the planet free float, ejected into orbit, and its oceans boil. The glut of death and suffering nearly knocks them to the floor and K’Surda grips the back of the pilot’s seat, her stomach hard and knotted.

She stares at the corona of distorted light around the planet, atmosphere flaring in every direction, the continents a patchwork of bright, raging infernos and dead, blackened landscape.

_“Billions will die because of you!”_

Angral’s words sear through her mind and K’Surda swallows the bile in her throat, pushing away from the seat.

“Kira…get Var Suthra on the holo.”

* * *

They had to help. It was their duty to help the remaining victims of this abhorrent waste of life, the survivors couldn’t just be abandoned to die alone, in fear and agony, but she understood why Captain Dal was afraid.

To see something that horrific as it happened obviously terrified him.

She doesn’t blame him for leaving.

She hopes she hasn’t sent the Daybreaker crew to their deaths.

* * *

K’Surda’s heart nearly seizes knowing Tython is poised to suffer the same fate. The Jedi, the Pilgrims, and the Flesh Raiders—none of them would survive, no chance to grow, and learn, and reconcile. All those younglings—all that knowledge.

She charges onto the Oppressor with fire in her veins and Angral’s name snarled between her teeth.

It ends today.

* * *

There’s an acute terror to watching someone you know and care for move against their will and seeing the Emperor—The Sith Emperor—insinuate himself over Kira’s free will turns that terror into rage. K’Surda knows she shouldn’t, rage is dangerous, and she pushes it down as hard as she can. But it burns hot and bright and she holds her lightsabers so tightly that they shake.

Kira rejects his presence after a moment and the rage abates, long enough for them to deal with Angral, to strike him down and stop this campaign of misery before it can harm anyone else.

She almost feels relieved, standing over him, ready to deal the killing blow—until lightning blasts him instead.

K’Surda turns, breath caught in her throat, and freezes. Kira is awash in darkness and hungering red energy again, coiling around her like smoke and teeth.

“I said let her go!” K’Surda growls, lifting her weapons defensively, “face me yourself!”

He mocks her, dismisses the very idea of doing so. She isn’t worth it, it’s unnecessary when he can simply force Kira to take care of it for him.

Kira launches at her, eyes cold and dead, swinging Angral’s lightsaber with a brutality that almost breaks K’Surda’s guard. She doesn’t want to hurt Kira but the longer she refuses to go on the offensive the closer Kira’s attacks come to seriously hurting her.

She has to fight Kira—she doesn’t want to.

She must.

She throws all that she is into her attacks, taking the Emperor by surprise at her sudden ferocity. Her blows send him stumbling and she presses any advantage it gives her, wearing Kira, wearing _him_ down until Angral’s lightsaber flies from Kira’s grip.

He backs away from her, sneering about Kira being ‘weak’ and ‘unfinished,’ and K’Surda prowls after him, breathing heavily, hands shaking with anger that he _dares_ use a good person like Kira in such a way.

“Now you will die. Even if my Child must die with you,” the Emperor snarls at her and throws Kira’s arms into the air. Lightning dances along them and unnatural shadows gather, pooling under her feet.

“No…” Kira’s voice breaks through, and K’Surda freezes. “I won’t kill for you!”

K’Surda extinguishes her weapons and pushes through the darkness, even as the smoke chokes her lungs and chills her flesh to the point of pain. She throws her arms around Kira. “You’re stronger than him!” she whispers fiercely, “you can break free, I believe in you Kira!”

Kira struggles for a moment, pulling against the Emperor’s strings, and a golden light begins to bleed from her body, pushing the darkness away, slow at first, then it’s a flood, exploding outwards in a warm, soothing wave. Kira slumps in her arms and K’Surda sits her down, holding onto her shoulders. “He… he’s gone,” Kira mutters, out of breath, “I won.”

She lifts her head, wearing a lop-sided grin. “I’m finally free.”

* * *

After all was said and done, K’Surda couldn’t be happier to see Kira recognised as the great Jedi she is. They defeated Angral, destroyed the Desolator, saved Tython, and Kira was free of the Emperor’s control.

She should find it easier to sleep, but the horror of Uphrades lingers in her thoughts, and Satele’s words hound her when she closes her eyes.

_“You will decide the fate of the Jedi… the Republic… the galaxy.”_

It feels like a world’s worth of weight pressing on her chest, but it’s a Jedi’s duty to shoulder a burden like that, she tells herself, and to do it well, without complaint, so others can live peacefully.

She hopes she’s up to it.


End file.
